Like the pharaohs of ancient Egypt, China’s first emperor, Qin Shi Huangdi (259 B.C.-210 B.C.), shared the obsession of preparing himself for the afterlife. And like those pyramid builders on the Nile, Qin also commanded a veritable army of slave laborers and craftsmen whose sole purpose was to create an army of terra cotta figures to serve as the emperor’s entourage in the great beyond.

“Terra Cotta Warriors: Guardians of China’s First Emperor” at the Bowers Museum in Santa Ana (through Oct. 12) offers an interesting overview of Emperor Qin’s ego-driven death trip, including displays of 20 full-size figures and an assortment of burial artifacts.

The first time representatives of “the army” visited Los Angeles was in 1987. That exhibit at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art featured three warriors (and if memory serves) a horse and a chariot. A later exhibition in Santa Barbara in 1998 featured 12.

The Bowers exhibition, while still just the tiniest fraction of the entire army, represents the largest U.S. loan of these objects to date, and the installation has been designed to provide visitors an educational as well as an artistic experience.

An audio tour and detailed wall panels explain how the emperor’s funerary mausoleum was first unearthed in 1974 near the town of Lintong. It also details the ongoing process of its excavation.

There are extensive descriptions that place the creation of the army within the historical context of ancient China, its construction, as well as the painstaking process of its restoration. That’s because when the figures were discovered, they existed as terra cotta fragments, not fully assembled figures.

Estimated at more than 7,000, the figures represent every element of an army on the move, including figures of servants, musicians, acrobats and animals.

According to the Chinese historian Sima Qian (145 B.C.-90 B.C.) construction of the mausoleum began in 246 B.C. and involved 700,000 workers. By Sima’s account, the emperor was buried along with his palaces, scenic towers, valuable utensils and 100 rivers fashioned in mercury.

During their construction, a prototype for the human forms was produced in an assembly-line fashion. Then each figure was given individualized facial features. And when it was all completed, just as in ancient Egypt, many of the finest artisans were given the “privilege” of accompanying their mighty emperor on his trip into the realm of the dead.

The loan of the “Terra Cotta Warriors” comes at a time when China is making a distinct effort to shine in the eyes of the world prior to the start of the Summer Olympics. The exhibition, while far from vast, is interesting, with almost as much space devoted to re-creations of objects as the real thing.

China’s first emperor was also known for the horrific treatment he inflicted on his people, including brutal punishments for minor offenses and the mass indoctrination of the people. Whether it was intended or not, China’s first emperor sounds a lot like Chairman Mao and the brutal mandates of “the Cultural Revolution.”

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